Loving Mountains Loving Men

On the first wood gathering of autumn, in forest that was once cornfield, slopes so rocky instead of wagons sleds were used, my father and I find the remains of a split-rail fence his grandfather set a century ago. American chestnut, brittle, stiff, resistant to rot — fine kindling now, to start spark beneath the red oak we will split today. Soon the garden will be blackened, the ponds too iced for geese, home forgather around the flame we insure this afternoon.

The stature of the chestnuts he holds in my father’s memory. Allen towered with them, rooted like Antaeus, fell soon after those giants dwindled and left across Appalachia their stubborn stumps.

What does a man like a chestnut tree leave behind? My middle and my family names. A white oak maul, handle smooth with use. Froe-split shingles to keep the cold rains off. Scars in the sides of sugar maples, scattered fence rails. And a grandson who shows his son how to split fallen oak with maul and wedge, how to carve elderberry twigs into sugar-water spiles. How to love mountains fiercer than any marriage….